Like they say, behind every good Shreveport Bossier Journal All-Metro Coach of the Year is a good woman.
Sometimes, that woman is eight months pregnant.
Meet Bonnie Matak Scogin, former Centenary softball standout, former Parkway High softball coach, and bride to Airline head football coach Justin Scogin, that SBJ Coach of the Year we were gabbing about.
The Scogins are also parents to son Brady, four-and-a-half years old. His little brother is due in five weeks, and yes, since both parents have playing and coaching experience, there was strategy involved concerning the preferred kickoff date.
“We wanted that three-year or four-year gap before I would have more kids,” Bonnie said. “Two kids in diapers, I mean …”
We parents know exactly what she means.
“And we definitely planned not to have another one during football season,” she said.
Sounds like Barry might have been born in …
“August,” she said. “Born in August.” She said it with a tone of relief and laughter, with the voice of someone who’d decided to take a beach vacation during monsoon season but lived to tell the story.
So, the new baby is thrilling offseason news. The football season news was thrilling too, but a different kind of birth. More accurately, a re-birth.
Scogin was hired in March to coach Airline, 1-9 last fall, and all he and his staff and their players did this fall was produce a perfect 7-0 run through District 1-5A to win the title.
That was after an 0-3 start, back when a district title was hardly expected, even from someone expecting.
“I always had faith, but I knew these things just take time,” Bonnie said. “I reminded him that someone had posted somewhere about the new ‘Scogin Era.’ Not the ‘Scogin Day’ or ‘Scogin Month.’ It’s not all going to happen in a day.”
But when it did start happening …
“Absolutely, it started to get really fun,” she said. “He tries to keep the coaching at school with the other coaches; he doesn’t talk to me much about it. But I could tell he had a lot more confidence after they started winning. Once you realize it can happen, you start thinking, ‘Hey, we can continue this.’ It just took that first time for it to happen.
“I thought it was awesome,” she said of the Coach of the Year honor, “especially for a first-year head coaching job to do what he and the staff were able to do with the program.”
It’s an honor that hasn’t gone to his head. “Most humble person you’d ever want to meet,” Bonnie said. “He always goes the extra mile for us. He’ll take Brady and go to a basketball game or baseball game (when Scogin was coaching at Leesville) and say, ‘You stay here and relax and we’ll go watch our players.’ He’s going to be there when he can to show support, but he’s still working to find ways to do it with family.”
He even spent his first day as All-Metro Coach performing the unassuming task of cleaning out closets — but not to get re-organized or tidy up.
“This is just still trying to get ready from when we moved in (during the spring),” Justin said. “We’ve never really gotten it done.”
Understandable. Team Scogin has been … well, a little busy.
Contact Teddy at teddy@latech.edu or on Twitter @MamaLuvsManning
